Not disagreeing with you, but there are also leaders like Jobs, Gates, Ellison etc. How come they are able to get amazing results, while being really nasty to their people?
The problem is with the people that try to emulate leaders like that - they try to play Steve Jobs in meetings and end up causing all of the damage without any of the greatness.
I can see how high high achievers could tend to be extremely focused and driven, which in some cases would present in this way. I wouldn't expect it to be the norm though; do you believe otherwise? How do you know?
Positions of power have a lot of leeway. If you're the big boss, people can't do much to remove you. It's different if you're trying to climb the corporate ladder; there are a lot of people ready and able to stomp on your fingers and knock you down a few rungs at the slightest offense.
I am of the (entirely uneducated) opinion that Jobs wasn't successful because he was an arsehole, but that he could only get away with being an arsehole because he was so successful.
When you're running a business, you can probably afford to be a jerk as long as the small group of people closest to you can tolerate it.